Light
by Libbytheblackcat
Summary: Just a little character study with a healthy dose of the metaphoric and a sweet little Romanogers overtone... -ish.


**Hi All, behold my first published foray into Avengers-land (now wouldn't that be an awesome theme park?). I'm honestly a bit embarrassed that it was this. I have a much nicer story that's actually got story features but it's wallowing unfinished in my 'I'll get to you when I have time' folder. I don't even really know what is with this, sorry... It rather just spawned out of my half asleep brain a few nights ago. Hope it is at least a few minutes of entertainment for you. All mistakes are mine, cover image is not, nor are the characters (who knew?)...**

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><p>She was dazzling in everything that she did. It was like she had some kind of fire that burned always. Like a lighthouse on the darkest night, glimmering through the shrouds of fog, warning of the danger within but always that pillar of hope. Dry land.<p>

Sometimes it was intense, dangerous, and it raged, how it raged. She was fire and destruction, barely constrained. Beautiful and terrible as the morning and the night. When she was like that you couldn't believe that anything could stand in her way.

Sometimes you could see it flaring brightly through her eyes, through her movements. This was as natural to her as breathing. It meant she was comfortable, felt safe in herself and her environment. But, like breathing, it was also a tool she could affect to suit a purpose. To see that? Now, that was breathtaking.

Then, sometimes it was muted. She kept it hidden, restrained but no less powerful. It is hard to hide in the shadows when you shine so intensely and hide in the shadows she did. So well, so patiently, so long could she hide and yet it burned on. Like a sun collapsed, condensed on itself, only to flare again more brightly, more deadly than before.

She could be so many people but in each of them it burned through. Dazzled. A fire that casts many shadows. The people she wears are only the shadows made possible by her internal light.

For all it's ferocity it was good too. Good intentions burning with the fuel of the bad that she had seen, that she had done. Warmth at its heart, when she let it be.

He wonders so often whether she sees it in herself. If there was ever a time when she saw it. He thinks there can't have been. He understands a little of the life she has lead. Can imagine the opportunities to see the true brightness of her heart have perhaps been too few and too far between.

She thinks of her life now as a debt owed. He understands. He still wishes she could see herself the way he sees her. He wishes that perhaps the world could see her as he sees her. He is unsure which is the least likely.

He's spent hours trying to capture a fraction of her on his page or his canvas though he'll never tell her. All the different aspects of herself, her true self, that are entirely out of reach except for the very few very fleeting moments he feels honoured to be privy to.

He's tried time and again to capture the fire, the shine, the dazzle. Always it seems he falls short. He's not daunted. He's taunted, in fact, almost daily by its illusive nature but he'd never complain.

He feels like a moth, drawn ever closer to a flame. He knows full well it could burn him, kill him, but it's warmth, it's dazzle, is much too alluring. He tempts the fates.

He thinks he might even be a little bit in love with her. That, he knows, is going to get him in trouble. It's rather too late to care though. He loves her even more because she honestly seems to be unaware of her brightness.

He wants to show her. He wants to protect her. He wants to be able to love her.

She would never allow any of that.

She cares too much. She thinks she owes too much. She thinks one day someone will come to collect.

He sees that too. It makes him sigh and return to his sketch book.

He understands. He accepts. He settles for the next best thing.

They compromise without a word between them. He's no Clint but he can offer his own special brand of friendship. It can never be enough but it's all they're allowed. For people like them a friendship is near enough to everything.

But still she dazzles.

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><p><strong>And that's all folks...<strong>

**Reviews, if you have the time or inclination, would be greatly appreciated :)**


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